促进我国经济增长的宏观税负与税制结构探析

我国目前宏观税负与税制结构是渐进式经济改革和税制改革的产物,随着市场化程度和对外开放程度的提高,它们对经济增长的扭曲效应越来越大。为了促进我国经济的长期增长和经济的持续发展,必须确定适度的宏观税负水平,推进税费改革,建立兼顾“公平”与“效率”的税制结构。     

The learning path of the hidden economy: the tax burden and tax evasion in New Zealand

This paper considers the ‘learning curve’ relationship between the aggregate tax rate and the relative size of the hidden economy in New Zealand. Some simple non-linear models are estimated so that the effects of changes in the effective tax rate on the underground economy can be simulated. This study finds that about half of the hidden activity in New Zealand is a learned response to changing opportunities and constraints in fiscal policy, but this amount varies over the business cycle. Simulating a zero tax rate permits us to discover the ‘natural rate’ of underground and criminal activity. Some partial lessons are drawn for taxation policy in that country.     

持续经济增长目标下的最优税负和税收结构调整

在经济持续增长目标下,通过识别宏观税负与经济增长的计量关系,我国最优宏观税负应为16.47%。这低于实际宏观税负水平,需要进行较大幅度的减税。根据税收影响经济增长的渠道,通过核算行业TFP,促进长期增长条件下的税收结构调整需要重点降低营业税。     

Taxation,corruption, and growth

We build an endogenous growth model to analyze the relationships between taxation, corruption, and economic growth. Entrepreneurs lie at the center of the model and face disincentive effects from taxation but acquire positive benefits from public infrastructure. Political corruption governs the efficiency with which tax revenues are translated into infrastructure. The model predicts an inverted-U relationship between taxation and growth, with corruption reducing the optimal taxation level. We find evidence consistent with these predictions and the entrepreneurial channel using data from the Longitudinal Business Database of the US Census Bureau. The marginal effect of taxation for growth for a state at the 10th or 25th percentile of corruption is significantly positive; on the other hand, the marginal effects of taxation for growth for a state at the 90th percentile of corruption are much lower across the board. We make progress towards causality through Granger-style tests and by considering periphery counties where effective tax policy is largely driven by bordering states. Finally, we calibrate our model and find that the calibrated taxation rate of 37% is fairly close to the model׳s estimated welfare maximizing taxation rate of 42%. Reducing corruption provides the largest potential impact for welfare gain through its impact on the uses of tax revenues.     

Consumption tax and economic growth in an overlapping generations model with money holdings

This paper examines the effect of a consumption tax on economic growth using an overlapping generations (OLG) model with money holdings. We show that the neutrality of the consumption tax does not hold in the money-in-the-utility-function model, because a change in consumption taxation induces the substitution of money holdings for consumption, and the money is the net wealth within the OLG structure. An increase in the consumption tax rate lowers (raises) the growth rate under a low (high) monetary expansion rate. On the other hand, in the cash-in-advance model and the money-in-the-production-function model, the neutrality of consumption taxation holds even within the OLG structure, because in these models there is no substitution of consumption and money holdings.     

Short-run and long-run effects of capital taxation on innovation and economic growth

In this study, we examine the effects of capital taxation on innovation and economic growth in an R&D-based growth model. We find that capital taxation has drastically different effects in the short run and in the long run. An increase in the capital income tax rate has both a consumption effect and a tax-shifting effect on the equilibrium growth rates of technology and output. In the short run, the consumption effect dominates the tax-shifting effect causing an initial negative effect of capital taxation on the equilibrium growth rates. However, in the long run, the tax-shifting effect becomes the dominant force yielding an overall positive effect of capital taxation on steady-state economic growth. These contrasting effects of capital taxation at different time horizons may provide a theoretical explanation for the mixed evidence in the empirical literature on capital taxation and economic growth.     

International and Intergenerational Aspects of Capital Income Taxation in an Endogenously Growing World Economy

This paper discusses how capital income taxation affects economic growth and welfare in an endogenously growing world economy with perfect capital mobility and worldwide externalities. Worldwide externalities provide a mechanism for equalizing national growth rates even with different capital income tax rates. The welfare of future generations is more influenced by a change in the growth rate than by the international spillover effect, which has been the primary concern of the previous studies. Moreover, our model finds intergenerational conflicts arising from the change in the growth rate caused by a change in the source tax rate of the foreign country.     

Environmental Tax Policy and Long-Run Economic Growth

This paper focuses on two competing effects of environmental taxation on long-run economic growth. One is a negative force, which hampers production; the other is a positive force, which increases the level of environmental quality bequeathed to future generations. The analysis shows that there exists a critical level of the tax that balances one force with the other. If the tax is initially set below (or above) the critical level, then raising the tax rate is beneficial (or harmful) to economic growth.
JEL Classification Numbers: D62, D91, H26, O11, O30, Q20     

Public investment,taxation, and long-run output in economies with multi-level governments

This paper examines the dynamic effects of taxation and investment on the steady state output level of an economy. A simple neoclassical growth model with different tiers of government is developed. The initial focus is on governments that aim to maximise their citizens' welfare and economic performance by providing consumption goods for private consumption and public capital for private production. It is shown that a long-run per capita output maximising tax rate can be derived and that there also exists an optimal degree of fiscal decentralisation. The analysis then extends to the case where governments attempt instead to maximise their own tax revenue to fund expenditures which do not contribute to the utility of their citizens. Three different cases of taxation arrangement are considered: tax competition, tax sharing, and tax coordination. The modeling shows that intensifying tax competition will lead to an increase in the aggregate tax rate as compared to the cases of sharing and coordination amongst governments. These tax rates are both higher than the long-run per capita output maximising rate that was implied under the welfare maximising government scenario.     

工业水污染税税率测算模型的构建与应用

］本文探索建立水污染税税率测算模型并应用设计水污染税率。首先,在比较国内外水污染税费制度的基础上,借鉴环境税和环境保护相关理论,将水污染经济损失模型与内梅罗修正指数模型相结合构建水污染税测算模型;第二,采用水污染税测算模型测算了2010年河北省水污染税税率水平应为14元/吨废水。这一标准远高于现行对每吨废水平均征收030元的标准,验证了我国水污染征收标准远不足以弥补治污成本的现状,应在环境税费改税改革中重新设计征税依据和税率水平。     

Fiscal Competition and Growth When Capital Is Imperfectly Mobile*

Is tax competition good for economic growth? We address this question using a simple model of endogenous growth. Governments in a system of many small jurisdictions benevolently maximize the welfare of immobile residents. Quadratic (de‐)installation costs limit the mobility of capital. We look at optimal taxation and long‐run growth, and we analyse the effects of cost parameter variations on taxation and growth. A race to the bottom in capital tax rates is only one possibility; the relationship between capital mobility and capital tax rates is not monotonic. Growth and capital mobility are unambiguously positively related.     

Institutional environment,ownership and firm taxation

This paper examines how ownership type and institutional environment affect firm taxation. Using a sample of Chinese‐listed firms from 1999 to 2006, we find that private firms enjoy a lower effective tax rate than local state‐owned enterprises. In addition, the preferential taxation of private firms is associated with local government incentives to promote local economic growth. We find that private firms located in regions with a lower level of privatization receive preferential tax treatment. Our results also suggest that decentralization and interjurisdictional competition lead to financial interdependence between local governments and private firms.     

Top marginal taxation and economic growth

The article explores the relationship between top marginal tax rates on personal income and economic growth. Using a data set of consistently measured top marginal tax rates for a panel of 18 OECD countries over the period 1965–2009, this article finds evidence in favour of a quadratic top tax–growth relationship. This represents the first reported evidence of a nonmonotonic significant relationship between top marginal income tax rates and economic growth. The point estimates of the regressions suggest that the marginal effect of higher top tax rates becomes negative above a growth-maximizing tax rate in the order of 60%. As top marginal tax rates observed after 1980 are below the estimated growth-maximizing level in most of the countries considered, a positive linear relationship between top marginal tax rates and GDP growth is found over the sub-period 1980–2009. Overall, results show that raising top marginal tax rates which are below their growth maximizing has the largest positive impact on growth when the related additional revenues are used to finance productive public expenditure, reduce budget deficits or reduce some other form of distortionary taxation.     

THE VANISHING BEQUEST TAX: THE COMPARATIVE EVOLUTION OF BEQUEST TAXATION IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Bequest tax revenues have been declining in OECD countries for at least 70 years. We propose an explanation that is based on a dynamic politico‐economic model where the evolution of bequest taxation is determined by wealth inequality. Since economic development induces a growing role of labor income and thus a reduction of wealth inequality, bequest taxation is reduced over time. The model also embeds a process of structural reallocation from agriculture to manufacturing and a consequent shift of the tax base from easy‐to‐tax land to hard‐to‐tax capital. This process implies a lower tax level and slower equalization‐induced tax reduction, the higher is the tax avoidance rate and the less developed is the economy. The introduction of franchise restrictions which are gradually lifted over time allows the hump‐shaped long‐term evolution of bequest taxation to be reproduced starting from the nineteenth century for those countries that are now modern industrial democracies. The evolution of political institutions also helps to explain the discrepancies currently observed between tax systems in developed and underdeveloped countries.     

西部大开发税收优惠政策实施效果评估

本文通过对西部开发税收优惠政策与地区经济增长、企业生产经营行为以及地方财政收入关系的评估分析,认为西部开发税收优惠政策对经济增长具有明显促进作用,对企业资产利润率提高也具有显著正效应.但从2002年到2004年西部开发税收政策对西部经济增长促进效应不断降低.最主要的原因是政策涉及的垄断企业多,市场化企业少;能源开发、环境污染严重企业享受多,实现地方可持续发展企业享受少;优惠税额主要促进了中央大型能源开采垄断企业,大多数有利于西部地区经济可持续发展的支柱产业得不到有效支持.所以提出:西部开发税收优惠政策在覆盖面上应做有增有减,并做出延长政策时效等调整.     

Relative Wealth, Consumption Taxation, and Economic Growth

This paper examines the role of the relative wealth-induced status motive in affecting the neutrality of consumption taxation in an optimizing growth model. It is found that a key factor determining the validity of the neutrality of consumption taxation in both the level sense and the growth rate sense is the desire for relative wealth-induced social status. When individuals care about their relative wealth, a rise in consumption tax enhances the steady-state level of capital stock and consumption. Furthermore, if the production function takes a linear technology form as the engine of sustained growth, then increases in consumption taxation raise the economy's long-run growth rate. In addition, an optimal consumption tax policy provides full subsidies to consumption so as to induce the economy to achieve the social optimum and the optimal growth rate.     

Growth and Welfare Effects of Tax Cuts: The Case of a Productive Public Input with Technological Risk

This paper analyzes the dynamic impact of tax cuts within a stochastic model of endogenous growth with a congested public input. A decreasing taxation of deterministic income parts leads to the well-known positive growth effect. Nevertheless, due to the insurance effect associated with the taxation of stochastic income flows, the overall growth impact of taxation is ambiguous. It is shown that the optimal structure of financing government expenditure does not only depend on the degree of rivalry but also on the degree of risk aversion. The optimal real value of government debt decreases with a rise in congestion. We identify that in the case of proportional congestion, the base for tax cuts should be the growth neutral consumption tax. Maximizing the growth rate does not automatically coincide with maximizing welfare. Hence, the base for tax cuts gains importance to realize a welfare optimal policy.     

Government financing in an endogenous growth model with financial market restrictions

Summary. In this paper, we develop an endogenous growth model with market regulations on explicitly modeled financial intermediaries to examine the effects of alternative government financing schemes on growth, inflation, and welfare. In the presence of binding regulation, there is always a unique equilibrium. We perform four alternative policy experiments; a change in the seigniorage tax rate, a change in the seigniorage tax base, a change in the income tax and a change in the fiscal-monetary policy mix. We find that in the presence of binding legal reserve requirements, a marginal increase in government spending need not result in a reduction in the rate of economic growth if it is financed with an increase in the seigniorage tax rate. Raising the seigniorage tax base by means of an increase in the reserve requirement retards growth and it has an ambiguous effect on inflation. An increase in income tax financed government spending also suppresses growth and raises inflation although not to the extent that the required seigniorage tax rate alternative would. Switching from seigniorage to income taxation as a source of government finance is growth reducing but deflationary. From a welfare perspective, the least distortionary way of financing an increase in the government spending requirements is by means of a marginal increase in the seigniorage tax rate. Under the specification of logarithmic preferences, the optimal tax structure is indeterminate. Received: March 20, 2000; revised version: June 26, 2001     

The demand for tax haven operations

What types of firms establish tax haven operations, and what purposes do these operations serve? Analysis of affiliate-level data for American firms indicates that larger, more international firms, and those with extensive intrafirm trade and high R and D intensities, are the most likely to use tax havens. Tax haven operations facilitate tax avoidance both by permitting firms to allocate taxable income away from high-tax jurisdictions and by reducing the burden of home country taxation of foreign income. The evidence suggests that the primary use of affiliates in larger tax haven countries is to reallocate taxable income, whereas the primary use of affiliates in smaller tax haven countries is to facilitate deferral of U.S. taxation of foreign income. Firms with sizeable foreign operations benefit the most from using tax havens, an effect that can be evaluated by using foreign economic growth rates as instruments for firm-level growth of foreign investment outside of tax havens. One percent greater sales and investment growth in nearby non-haven countries is associated with a 1.5 to 2% greater likelihood of establishing a tax haven operation.     

与生态环境建设相适应的我国财政体制改革

财税制度作为经济的重要调控手段,在我国的生态环境建设中发挥着重要的作用。深化财税体制改革,一方面要增加财政投入,加大财政的支持力度;另一方面,要实施减免税收、差别利率等税收优惠政策,实现财政、税收双管齐下,构建财税联动机制,强化对生态工程和循环型经济项目的支持力度,增强财税对生态建设和循环经济建设的支持和调节功能,这将是未来我国财税在这方面改革的主导方向。